


5x03: To New Heights

by nightbirdrises



Series: S5 Reaction Drabbles [3]
Category: Glee
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Reaction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-11
Updated: 2013-10-11
Packaged: 2017-12-29 02:14:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/999665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightbirdrises/pseuds/nightbirdrises
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was started immediately after the episode and finished about an hour later. I realize it's incredibly soon so I don't expect people to read it until they're ready - this is, apparently, how I cope. There are canon relationships involved but they're not the focus so I figured I shouldn't tag 'em.</p><p>tumblr: <a href="http://princehummel.tumblr.com/post/63709238563">[x]</a></p>
    </blockquote>





	5x03: To New Heights

**Author's Note:**

> This was started immediately after the episode and finished about an hour later. I realize it's incredibly soon so I don't expect people to read it until they're ready - this is, apparently, how I cope. There are canon relationships involved but they're not the focus so I figured I shouldn't tag 'em.
> 
> tumblr: [[x]](http://princehummel.tumblr.com/post/63709238563)

**2015**

"It’s taller than he was."

Jake inspects the thin trunk of the tree with a barely-there smile. The marks are still there but they show signs of fading soon. He’d recognize that pocketknife-handwriting anywhere at this point, after watching his half-brother show him all the right ways to do it. He’s still not sure why he’ll ever need to know how to carve out messages in an efficient way, but it doesn’t really matter.

"Kinda hard to believe, isn’t it?" he says, looking back up at Marley. They have their graduation gowns on still, the red fabric nearly blinding in the sunlight. "I mean how tall it is."

Marley stares up at the topmost branches. “Does it still feel like it was all a dream, to you?”

"Yeah. It makes sense, though, right? We didn’t know him for very long."

Jake stands and frowns when Marley shakes her head. “We knew him long enough for us to miss him. Two years later — we’re graduating, the two of us are going to L.A. to take over Puck’s old apartment, and we still miss him.”

There’s a question in her words but Jake doesn’t have an answer. He’s saved by the bell, though — or, rather, by Ryder yelling their names.

"We gotta get a picture together, all three of us," Ryder declares when he reaches them, energized as he somehow always is. "And Finn."

"You want to take a picture with a tree?" Jake asks skeptically. Marley understands more quickly, though, and smiles.

"Dude, that guy is the main reason we became friends. I wouldn’t be wearing this crazy gown if it weren’t for him and you, you know? So we’re taking a picture with Finn."

That’s that; the three of them pose in a hundred different ways around the tree, around the plaque, and just with each other in the grass surrounding it. There’s an energy in the air — they’re moving on, moving up, and it’s exhilarating. It’s a new start.

  
**2018**

"I’m pretty sure that’s the same port-a-potty I got locked in multiple times," Artie says dryly as he rolls himself around the fence at Sam’s side. Sam’s on his phone, though, sending off a quick text to Burt —  _we’re visiting him now, we’ll be over for dinner soon. thanks for the invite Big B!_

"You got locked in those things?" he asks once his mind catches up to his ears. "That’s messed up."

"Yeah, well, it was just life," Artie says with a shrug. "It sucked but now I’m on top of the independent film world."

"With me."

Artie stares. “Sam, you’ve never been in any of my films. You said you were waiting until I would accept the inevitable and cast you as Wolverine. Which, by the way, still isn’t happening.”

"I’m gonna be Wolverine before Blaine ever is, man, that’s like the only thing from high school that we’re still arguing over."

"He bickers more with you than he does with his own husband," Artie mutters, but then they’re there. "It actually looks like a real tree now."

"Yeah." Sam crouches down in the shade of the tree and Artie rolls in next to him. They just watch the leaves blow for a while, the light golden as the sun sets. Sam leans over to brush some dirt off of the plaque, which already looks slightly weather-worn after five years.

They don’t say anything else; Artie looks at Sam and the latter nods, standing. After all, there’s really nothing either of them can say, and there’s pizza waiting for them at the Hudson-Hummel home.

  
**2019**

"Never coming back" apparently means "See you all in six years," Santana thinks with a scoff. She’s only in Lima for one reason, though, and it has everything to do with what still hurts, but dully so.

She has Mercedes with her; the two had grown close again despite living on opposite sides of the country, and this is their reunion as much as anything else. So there are two reasons.

Three: her mom wants to taste a recipe she learned from Kurt in spite of every effort  _not_  to admit that she’d actually listened to the guy talk for more than ten minutes straight. But whatever. She has something to do first.

"Everything looks exactly the same," Mercedes observes after they’ve taken an obligatory tour of the empty hallways — their key, of course, is courtesy of Sue Sylvester. "Can you believe it’s been seven years since we graduated?"

"I can," Santana says with absolute certainty. "It’s been the longest almost-decade of my life. The four shitty years we spent here should feel like nothing compared to that."

"But it’s everything, isn’t it?"

"It’s something, that’s for sure."

They’re at the tree within a few minutes and it’s the first time Santana has actually noticed the word scrawled into the trunk. It’s just a scar now, hardly visible, but she doesn’t have to wonder who put it there.

Mercedes watches Santana for a long few seconds and rolls her eyes, locking their arms together. “Come on, Miss Lopez. I know you’ve got something important to say.”

"It’s not that important, I just—" Mercedes fixes her with a stern look and she sets her jaw, looking back at the tree. "Okay. I lost the ‘Nice Things About Hudson’ list about five years ago and I can’t come up with something like that again without gagging at myself, but I wanted to formally and officially apologize for all the high school insults. I know I’m late, but you were late all the time to class even though you had the longest legs of any land mammal, so you get it.

"That’s all I’ve got," she finishes rather lamely, wincing at herself. Maybe she should have written something.

"That’s good. Are we heading back?" Mercedes says gently. Santana nods. "See you, Finn."

  
**2020**

A young woman in a slim, business-appropriate dress walks up to the tree at sunrise one day. No words are left behind — only a fresh wrist corsage with an old green ribbon.

The next day, though they don’t run into each other, another young woman — also blonde, also beautiful — stands underneath the tree. She smiles, kisses the trunk, and leaves a crayon drawing next to the corsage. It’s of a T-Rex and a unicorn with two horns.

The next month, Tina and Mike stop by with a picnic. They share in grilled cheeses with smiles and small talk as good friends with one of their greatest friends shading them from the summer sun.

  
**2023**

He can’t believe he’s turning  _thirty_  in a week. He also can’t believe how little Lima has changed — they’ve visited more than a few times before, of course, but it never fails to amaze Kurt just how slow-moving his hometown is. It’s a sloth to New York’s hawk.

There’s a weird sense of deja vu as he and Blaine stroll through the courtyard arm-in-arm, the world now having changed enough that there’s no real lingering fear in the back of their minds. It had been there even when they’d kissed on top of a lunch table in front of a crowd of students at a school with a history of bullying — but it’s gone.

It’s a Saturday, so there aren’t any students here now. Blaine grins. “We could have set up a picnic again.”

Kurt snorts. “I should have brought that antique boombox you’re so fond of.”

"Okay, I know you’re about to embark on a new decade of life, but we’re not old enough for boomboxes to be  _antique_.”

"In another ten years I’ll be forty, Blaine. Then fifty. It feels like my life is half over and there’s still so much I want to do."

"Like…"

"Like kids. We’ve talked about this."

"Right. Should we, you know, look into adopting soon?"

Kurt leads Blaine around towards the football field, eyes fixed on something on the horizon. “Yes.”

Blaine realizes where they’re going within seconds and falls silent. He’s still a little shaken, if he’s honest with himself, which is ridiculous because it’s been ten years. The last time they’d visited their brother (Kurt had scoffed the first time Blaine called him a brother-in-law — “He wasn’t  _technically_  my brother but I still called him that. It goes for you, too, if that’s okay with you”) it had been a month or so after their wedding. Kurt had shakily introduced Blaine as part of the family and Blaine had promised to take care of “your little brother.”

They’d talked to Kurt’s mom that day, too.

He should be okay, and he is — so is Kurt — but it doesn’t mean they both don’t experience a kind of hush as they approach the tree and the plaque below it.

Kurt shakes his head and speaks first. “He’s so tall now. Not that he was never not tall, but the tree kind of just…” He trails off with a vague gesture that he knows Blaine will understand completely. It’s just how they work; communication is rarely a barrier now.

"He was larger than life though, wasn’t he?" Blaine says quietly. "I don’t know if the tree will ever get as big as his… his character, I guess."

"You’re right." Kurt sighs and sits down; he allows himself to lean against the tree, the trunk wide and sturdy enough to support him. Blaine settles between his legs so that his back meets Kurt’s chest. They breathe together. "Ten years ago I thought it was the worst possible thing, that I would miss him forever. But I think if I ever stopped missing him, then he really would be gone."

Blaine hums, rubbing his hand comfortingly along Kurt’s thigh. “We’ve grown a lot.”

"It doesn’t feel like it."

Chuckling, Blaine nods. “It’ll feel like it when we start getting grey hairs and my tummy starts to fill out even more.”

"I wouldn’t mind more tummy. That just means a bigger pillow for me." Blaine shoves at Kurt’s leg and he laughs, deep and sincere.

"What I’m saying is that, through this tree, Finn’ll be growing for a long time. In a way, he’ll be able to see his grandnieces and grandnephews."

"Just how many kids do you plan on having?"

"A hundred, and each of them with the name of a different reality TV personality."

It’s Kurt’s turn to shove Blaine and they dissolve into giggles. Once they fade, Kurt rests his cheek against Blaine’s, tucking his chin over his shoulder. “We’ll tell them all about him, won’t we?”

Blaine turns into a brief, awkwardly-angled kiss before answering, “Of course. I bet we could write entire books about the adventures of Ohio’s Superman, otherwise known as the Great Treble Clef.”

"And the best brother and uncle in the world."

Humming his agreement, Blaine drifts into sleep, Kurt close behind.

  
**2025**

All it takes is a brand-new pocketknife and QUARTERBACK is carved fresh and new into the trunk of the tree. Puck stands back, admiring his handiwork, and finds himself saluting his best friend. He doesn’t feel stupid in the slightest — just as he has the utmost respect for his Master Sergeant, he has it (or quite possibly even more of it) for his quarterback.

He has his life under control for once, he’s saving  _lives_ , and he owes it all to so many people. But mostly him.

Puck flexes his hand; on the back of it is a tattoo of a single line. He smiles and returns to his motorbike, driving off with a loud roar and a relatively faint “Love you, bro!”

  
**2028**

Rachel Berry practically skips to the tree in her excitement. She hasn’t been in Lima for years now and, although it’s as hopelessly dull as ever, she has something very important to share. Well, two somethings, actually.

From a bag over her shoulder she pulls two objects that are nearly — but not quite — identical. They’re Tony Awards, one from when she was twenty-four, the one that fulfilled her goal, and one from the most recent ceremony. She also has the script from a new Woody Allen movie she’s recently been cast in; she pulls that out as well and secures it underneath one of the awards to keep it from blowing away.

She kneels down to place them gingerly next to the small plaque. It’s not permanent, of course; she has to bring them back, but she likes the way they look next to him.

After that she straightens up and  _beams_ , cheeks pink and a warmth spreading throughout her body.

"I’m home."


End file.
